


Dynasty Decapitated

by Magpiie



Category: Beetlejuice - Perfect/Brown & King
Genre: Canon-Typical Drug References, Canon-Typical Suicide Reference, Gen, Post-Canon, no ships, taking liberties with Netherworld lore
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:34:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23592421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magpiie/pseuds/Magpiie
Summary: Beetlejuice returns to the Netherworld to party like hell for a few thousand years. Unfortunately for him, the resident ghosts have other plans for him. Or, Beej gets an office job and it just might be the death of him.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 22





	Dynasty Decapitated

**Author's Note:**

> "Done my time and served my sentence  
> Dress me up and watch me die  
> If it feels good, tastes good  
> It must be mine  
> Dynasty decapitated  
> You just might see a ghost tonight"  
> \- Emperor's New Clothes, Panic! At The Disco
> 
> I'd love someone to discuss this fic with and possibly beta upcoming chapters. Hit me up at bumble--bean on Tumblr if ya wanna make friends! 👋

"So then I was like, 'Lucifer'?! I hardly know 'er!" The crowd around him burst into uproarious laughter and, with a delighted grin, Beetlejuice leaned down to take a bump off the bar. The music was loud enough to rattle your teeth, and the people around him were hanging on his every word, and the drinks were strong enough to burn holes in your internal organs. Everything was good in the Netherworld. He tapped two fingers on the rim of the shot glass in front of him and nodded to the woman behind the bar.

"Hit me, babe." She filled the glass up to the top and he knocked it back. The other bartenders were frantic, trying to keep up with the demand - as news of Juno's "unfortunate accident" had spread through the Netherworld, order had quickly disintegrated and a spirit of non-stop debauchery had blossomed - but the ghost who had served him stood still, bottle in hand, in front of him. A determined squint brought her into focus. She was gaunt and pale, like many of the other residents here, but her stance was unusual. Most ghosts skulked around in nervous misery, but there was an easy confidence in the line of her shoulders and a cool intelligence in her eyes. And she was staring at him. He grinned and winked at her, but she didn't respond. He felt prickles of purple at the roots of his hair. "Not enjoying the party?"  
"Not especially," she answered coolly. "But I…" Her eyes fell to the bar and her brow furrowed. He leaned forward with an easy smile.  
"Look, if you're trying to hit on me, then-"  
"No, um..." She was twisting uncomfortably, trying to find the right words. "You know these people aren't uh… Here for the party, right?" Beetlejuice quirked an eyebrow at her, then made a show of looking around at the rowdy crowd, and laughed in disbelief.  
"They sure look like they're partying to me."  
"No, they're-" With a frustrated sigh, she set the bottle on the bar between them. He reached out for it, and she slid it back towards her. "They're here for you."  
"Well, I'm a popular guy," he shot back.  
"I don't think you're understanding me. Do you really think all these people are here just to enjoy your company?"  
"Woah, none taken," he muttered, but another, more subtle glance around revealed that many of the revellers were indeed keeping a surreptitious eye on him. His hackles began to rise. "Look, your job is pouring drinks. So can you just do that?"  
"I'm sorry, but I'm trying to do you a favour here. Everyone thought you were doing this on purpose, but now it's pretty clear you just didn't realise, and I think it's only kind to tell you."  
"Oh yeah?" he asked, aiming for nonchalance and seriously missing the mark. "Tell me what?"  
"That you're the guy who's supposed to be in charge, and they're waiting for you to start-" He cut her off with a bark of laughter and tapped his glass again.  
"Alright, classic. Man, you really had me going there!"  
"I'm not kidding," she said firmly. He exhaled hard, jaw tightening.  
"What, 'cause I'm that old witch's son? That meant very little up til now."  
"No, because- oh. I didn't know that." The demon fixed her with a warning glare, and she shook the thought away. "Well, from what I hear, it's because you killed her."  
"Oh, well now, killed is a strong word-"  
"And the Handbook says-"  
"Oh, the fucking Handbook!" He clapped his hands over his face and groaned, then slammed them down on the counter between them and leaned up towards her. His hair was now unmistakably crimson. "And where the fuck did you hear all this, huh? You're just a fucking bartender, and a pretty poor one at that." He could feel his eyes turning black and his teeth sharpening to points. She blinked at him, utterly nonplussed.  
"It's what everyone's saying."

A lot of the conversation had ended around him now, and people were openly watching the events unfold. The music had faded down to maybe half of its original volume. He slumped back into his seat and smoothed his hands over his hair. _Green, green, please go green._ It felt more like purple. _Fuck_. He chewed on his lip for a moment, then turned to address the damn parasites all around him.  
"Is that right?" he shouted and, one by one, each head in the crowd began nodding. And then, a barrage of concerns and complaints:  
My husband died four weeks ago, and he's still in the waiting room. Or, I've been here for hundreds of years and still not found anyone I know. Or, everyone else who works at my office has escaped back to the world of the living, and I wanna go too. Or just, I'm lonely. I'm bored. I'm being tortured too much. I'm not being tortured enough. This place is horrible. Beetlejuice screwed his eyes shut and took in a deep breath.  
"Alright, assholes, in case you haven't noticed? This is the best this place has ever been. You guys all seriously want more rules? Somebody else in charge, to boss you around for eternity? Are you out of your damn minds?!" He swept his gaze over the crowd, getting desperate. Attention was only fun when it didn't come with responsibility. "Okay, so you want things to go back to being lame? Fine! But you idiots want me to be in charge?? All of you have just watched me snort coke and tell jokes that don't make sense for, like, 48 hours!"

The room was silent now, everyone just watching expectantly. It made his skin itch. Behind him came the unmistakable sound of a drink being poured and slid across the bar, and when he turned to take it, the bartender was smiling at him. It was a smile that was somehow at once sharp and gentle, a knowing smirk with kindness in the eyes. It reminded him of Barbara: it was the know-it-all mother hen smile. He scowled at the bartender. She clapped a hand on his shoulder.  
"Congratulations on the new job!"

\---

Eventually, with no small amount of sleight of hand and a brief sprint down a dark alley, Beetlejuice had managed to ditch the rabble and slink into Juno's old office unnoticed. The still air was thick with cigarette smoke and the sweet stink of sherry, and he wrinkled his nose at the memories the smells conjured. There was only one window and it got stuck halfway open, but at least the whole Juno atmosphere was at least somewhat diluted by the smog outside.  
"Well, this is the worst," he muttered to nobody in particular, pushing a stack of yellowed paper off the desk and watching it flutter to the ground with cat-like pettiness and disdain. He stood a few moments just staring at the ashtray and the papers and the photos on the desk: there were no photos of him, but several of her pet scorpions. As hurtful as that was, he couldn't stay mad at the scorpions. Finally the silence became suffocating, and he turned to the filing cabinets behind him and started rifling through them just to hear the squeak of the drawers and the rustle of paper. 

He was halfway through D. B. Cooper's file - a gripping read with lots of gross pictures - when the first knock sounded on the glass pane of the closed door. He glanced up from where he was reclined in the office chair, feet up on the desk and utterly unnecessary reading glasses perched on his nose, to see the silhouettes of several people through the frosted glass.  
"Occupied," he called, returning his attention to the file. There was the sound of hushed conversation from the other side of the door, and then the knock sounded again.  
"Sorry sir," a thin voice drizzled through the door. "Only, I have some questions about infrastructure and-"  
"He's not here," he called distractedly, picking a crime scene photograph up to peer at it. "Leave a note with the secretary and he'll get back to you ASAP." There was the sound of more muttering, and then:  
"Sorry, sir, uh… Which secretary would that be?" Forced to accept that he wasn't going to be left alone, he tossed the file onto the desk with a frustrated little huff. And then it dawned on him: he was a genius.

The door flew open so fast the little gaggle outside jumped in surprise, and the demon leaned out and pointed to the first face he saw - the very sad-looking old dude that he guessed had been talking before.  
"You're right - I need an assistant. Get on that right away. Interviews start tomorrow." The man jumped to attention and started scrambling around the room for a pen and some paper, and Beetlejuice felt a thrill of power. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all. There was a little old lady with comically large glasses on. He gestured at her vaguely. "This office needs spruced up. Dust the place. Maybe redecorate. Something tasteful - I'm thinking lawn ornaments. And you!" He swung his hand blindly to point at a young man with a nasty rope burn around his neck, then paused while he thought of another job for him to do. "Get a coffee for the first guy!"

\---

The events from the past few days had shaken him - particularly the heavy feeling that had weighed in his gut since he had, briefly, been alive and felt human emotions. He had thought he'd felt emotions before but, looking back now, they were little more than impulses. Feel bad? Take something that makes you feel good. Feel good? Chase that feeling, consequences be damned. Feel angry? Take it out on anything and everything around you. Don't stop to think, don't bother with regrets, just keep doing things because they feel right in the moment. It was simple, bestial. Feeling human emotions had been like thinking you were a master mathematician, and then finding out about algebra. 

Still reeling from it all, and decidedly trying to avoid feeling all the complicated new shit, his plan had been to drown his sorrows for a couple of centuries. Becoming a bureaucrat had pretty much been at the bottom of his list. But then again, being the boss was sort of like having friends, except better because they had to do whatever you said. Maybe this was exactly what he needed.

That positivity about his situation quickly sputtered and died when he arrived to the office the next morning to a sea of people to interview for the role of his glamorous assistant. The moment the first candidate sat down opposite him, he realised he had absolutely no clue what he was doing.

His first instinct was to just pick the first candidate he deemed attractive enough, which made sense if he was going to have to look at them for the foreseeable future, but he quickly found that the very thought of trying to flirt and banter like usual gave him a weary feeling in his chest and made his hair fade to a colour he didn't recognise the feeling of.

So what then, the most qualified for the position? Yawn. He hadn't even bothered to really consider what the role of this person should be. Essentially he wanted them just to do his job and give him the credit, but none of the interviewees seemed either capable of or willing to do that.

Ultimately, he found himself comparing every single candidate to Lydia. They had to be fun, but still smart enough to answer back. They had to be on his level the way she was. They had to be, to put it precisely, just the right flavour of strange and unusual. 

None of them were hitting the mark.

By the end of the day he hadn't hired a single person, and he was staring listlessly at the ceiling when the old man he'd roped into organising this whole debacle appeared at his door again.  
"Last one," he muttered, having given up on any formalities long ago. There were footsteps as the final candidate entered to stand on the other side of the desk. He couldn't be bothered to turn and look at them. He was tired of looking at people, especially the ones that looked all lost and needy and sad. It was starting to really bring the mood of the place down.  
"What makes you think you'd be right for this job?" Beetlejuice repeated flatly for perhaps the billionth time that day. The candidate was silent for several moments, and he opened his mouth to reject them when he heard the soft noise of glass on wood. He glanced toward it. They had put a bottle on the desk. Judging by the label, it was pure ethanol. His hair flashed a neon green, and he whirled his chair to face them - and recognised them instantly. His face fell into a grimace and the green faded.  
"Oh," he grumbled. "Bartender." She laughed brightly at him, revealing a tongue piercing, and his scowl deepened.  
"How's the first day on the job?"  
"I'm in hell. In every possible way, I am in hell." She laughed again. He bristled. "I'm glad someone gets a kick out of it. What's this? Apology gift?"  
"Nah, thought a little bribery might get me the job."  
"What? Don't be ridiculous. You already have a job. You can't work here with a name like Bartender, it wouldn't make any sense."  
"Well then, maybe you could try calling me by my actual name. It's Emily." She held out a hand for him to shake. "Emily Deetz."  
His eyes went wide, and he clapped his hand into hers with such ferocity that she jumped a little.  
"You're hired!"


End file.
